The day has finally come, the day I’ve been patiently waiting to arrive for over two months is here: the day of my first conference. I woke up early, ate a hearty breakfast, dressed to impress, and got there at 9 AM sharp. By the time I left at 5 pm, I was completely underwhelmed. I barely talked to any physicians, was desperately trying to stay awake during presentations, and was being drawn to distractions all around me. I thought to myself why was the conference such a disappointment? I thought I did everything right. I remember looking to my left and my right and everyone else was so much more involved than me, so I figured it wasn’t the conference that went wrong, I simply did not go in prepared. I figured I was far from the only pre-med to feel as if they completely failed a conference, so I did a little research to help prevent any pre-med attending to a conference soon avoid making the same mistakes I made by writing a quick conference do’s and don’ts list:

DO: Network Network Network!!!-What is the point of a conference if you don’t talk to anyone? Medical conferences are a place where you can make yourself known to physicians, medical deans, recruitment officers, and more people who can potentially have a large impact on the next four or more years of your life. Talking to physicians can mean shadowing or research opportunities, networking with recruitment officers can mean knowledge on what their admissions committee is looking for, and networking with your fellow students can lead to a new accountability buddy to help you throughout the hard journey.

DON’T: Be that silent person sitting in the back-Yes, sometimes in these big conferences the sheer amount of people is overwhelming. Me, being the introvert that I am, secretly cannot wait to be back in my car, able to hear my own thoughts. However, you came to the conference for a reason. Imagine you’re at your high school prom and you see your crush all alone in front of you. You really want to talk to them, but your legs won’t move. Eventually, they walk away and find someone else to talk to. Now replace your crush with the recruitment officer of your dream school-sucks, right? Sometimes you have to swallow your fears and fake it ‘til you make it. Need a minute? Go into the bathroom, take a few deep breaths, go back out there prepared to wow people.

DO: Bring business cards and resumes to the event-The purpose of these events are two-fold: soak up new knowledge while also selling yourself. While you may truly be remarkable, medical personnel meet so many students at these events that it is hard for them to remember everyone. Make yourself stand out by giving them something to remember you by. If you have a nice talk with a recruiter or physician give them your business card with your name and contact information. Some may even want your resume, which can really lead to you standing out from the rest as they have a copy of not only your name but your accomplishments.

DON’T: come with nothing to write with-This goes back to the first purpose of these events. Imagine you’re learning so much information it is hard to keep up with, the presenter’s been talking for 20 minutes and you can’t remember what they said 5 minutes ago. You are lost, and with no pencil or notebook, the information is potentially lost forever. I personally carry a 3×5 memo book everywhere I go in case I find something I just have to write down, and these small notepads can be perfect for soaking up and jotting down as much from a presenter as possible.

DO: Talk to medical students as well, not just doctors and faculty-There are two reasons why I think this is an important point: first of all, as a pre-med, faculty is there with one goal and that is to promote their school. They will tell you everything amazing about their school and you will leave thinking like “man, this school sounds perfect.” The medical students on the other hand do not have much incentive to sugarcoat things. Maybe their version of the culture is very different from the recruiter’s version, while the recruiters may say the teachers push their students to their academic limits the medical students say that the teachers are cruel and unforgiving. The second reason is in regards to the change in times. It might have been decades since the doctors at the schools have been in medical school, so their information has the chance to be vastly outdated. However, the medical students are probably your contemporaries, and can paint a picture of the medical school lifestyle that you’ll be living.

DON’T: appear uninterested: the phone can wait-This is extremely important. There are very few things as disrespectful as being on your phone while someone is speaking. A conversation can be going amazingly, and the second you instinctively pull out your phone once it buzzes alerting you about the newest tweet, the conversation can go sour. Even if someone is giving a presentation and you are sitting along with hundreds of others, every second on the phone is a second where you don’t receive valuable information. Put the phone on silent and soak up all of the information you can.

I hope this post helps some of the other pre-med students out there. This is not only information I hope you all learn, this is information that I wish I told myself two days ago so I could have come into my first conference fully prepared and left feeling as if I learned something. If you all have any more conference tips don’t be afraid to add a comment.

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